About 20,000 people are expected to receive booster jabs at Harrogate’s Great Yorkshire Showground between December 6 and 22. Another 35,000 are set to follow in the New Year.

Most people who go agree it’s a slick, well-run operation. That it works so well is down to the efforts of 50 staff and 60 volunteers behind the life-saving operation.

The Stray Ferret spoke to some of those on site this week. The 60 volunteers are divided into four teams of 15 volunteers a day supplied on alternate days by community groups Boroughbridge Community Care, Harrogate and District Community Action, Nidderdale Plus and Knaresborough Connectors.

The Boroughbridge team, led by volunteer coordinator Jan Seymour, was on duty when we visited.

Ms Seymour was holding a box of chocolates, donated by a patient. All such gifts get shared between the helpers. She jokes:

“The people we like most are the ones that bring us chocolate and cake!

Jan Seymour

The set-up at the Yorkshire Event Centre is the same as it was from February to August this year when some 120,000 first and second dose vaccines were administered.

The volunteers remain relentlessly cheerful and helpful but there is a wearier feel to the place than there was in spring. Ms Seymour says:

“When we opened in February everyone was absolutely desperate to get it. Now the attitude is ‘I’m a bit busy today, can I come tomorrow?'”.

Volunteers typically do half a day each, either from 8am to 1pm or 1pm to 6pm. They meet and greet people, direct traffic and take people to one of the 16 vaccination pods, which can cater for up to eight vaccinators. Ms Seymour says:

“During lockdown it was easy to get volunteers but recently it’s become harder. Some people are back at work and many volunteers are older people who have childcare duties.

“The majority of patients are absolutely wonderful. They could not be more thankful. We get the odd one who isn’t. One guy had a go at me on Monday when he said ‘why can’t I go to my doctor for this? But that’s unusual. Most people are great.”

Staffing fatigue

Yorkshire Health Network, which is a federation of the 17 GP practices in the Harrogate district, manages the vaccination sites at Harrogate and Ripon racecourse.

Tim Yarrow, operations manager for the network, says the Harrogate site can handle greater numbers of walk-in patients because of its size and abundant parking.

Tim Yarrow

The quietest time, he says, is early to mid afternoon, then numbers soar towards the end of the day as many people try to get in at the end of their working days. The decision to allow walk-ins this week sparked a surge of visitors with queues of up to an hour at peak times.

Mr Yarrow says:

“We set this up in one-and-a-half days. It was easier second time round. We knew the snagging points from last time.

“The main challenge is staffing fatigue. During lockdown we had a lot of people with not a lot else to do. As people have gone back to their day jobs their availability has become more sparse.”

Yorkshire Agricultural Society, which owns the site, has “bent over backwards to enable it to happen”, says Mr Yarrow. When the site re-opens in January, jabs will take place in another building at the showground so the society can resume holding events in the Yorkshire Event Centre.

Moderna provided

Barnaby Roe, general manager of Yorkshire Health Network, oversees the operation at the showground.

In a makeshift office on site, he explains that the 50 staff are comprised of GP practice staff, who are helping for free on their days off, members of Yorkshire Health Network, pharmacists, pharmacist technicians and nurses. Half work the morning shift and half work in the afternoon.

“This programme will be for 20,000 to December 22 then going forward we think it will be another 35,000.”

Barnaby Roe

The site is giving doses of the Moderna booster but also administers some Pfizer jabs to children from immunosuppressed families.

“The people who work here have done it for some time and it’s down to a fine art.”

Booster appointments can be booked at the showground here. The site provided some walk-in appointments this week for over-18s who were eligible for jabs and has yet to decide whether they will be available next week.

District residents will be able to get vaccinated without appointments at a number of pop-up coronavirus clinics this weekend.

The clinics will open in Harrogate, Knaresborough and Pateley Bridge tomorrow and Sunday, and are part of a final push to get younger people vaccinated.

First and second doses will be offered to anyone aged over 18, while any care workers and those aged over 50 who have not yet taken up the opportunity to get vaccinated are also being urged to come forward.

The Wesley Centre on Oxford Street, Harrogate will offer first doses of the Pfizer vaccine on Saturday between 10am to 4pm.

In Knaresborough, the Homecare Pharmacy Vaccination Centre at the former Lidl site on York Road will offer first doses of the Moderna jab on Saturday and Sunday between 9am and 5pm.

And in Pateley Bridge, both first and second doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be available at Bishopside and Bewerley Memorial Hall on Park Road on Saturday between 8am and 5.50pm.

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Sue Peckitt, chief nurse at NHS North Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group, said:

“These walk-in clinics are aimed at those people who have not taken up the opportunity to book their vaccine via the NHS National Booking Service or NHS 119.”

Driven by the faster-spreading Delta variant, Harrogate’s weekly infection rate is approaching record levels with a current average of 416 cases per 100,000 people.

The highest rate on record was 497 at the beginning of January.

The rise in infections has been followed by a slight increase in hospital admissions with five patients in Harrogate on Wednesday, although the hospital has not recorded a Covid-related death in more than three months.

Louise Wallace, director of public health for North Yorkshire, said this was down to vaccines weakening the link between infections and serious illness, as she also urged people to make use of the pop-up clinics this weekend.

She said:

“Vaccination is the most effective way to reduce the risk of developing serious or life-threatening symptoms from coronavirus, as well as protecting others in the community.

“The vaccination programme in this country has been a huge success and the numbers of people becoming seriously ill, or dying, as a result of contracting the disease have fallen dramatically.